The Art of Wanting and Receiving

The Courts were arguing again.

Perhaps the Winter Queen wasn't helping — she could have done without setting Wenes on his knees, though she’d granted him a pillow, and perhaps it would have been better to remove his chains. But Wenes was hers, hers for another two months, and she wouldn’t lose so much as a moment to spend with him as she wished.

She shifted, crossing her legs at the ankle, as her boy’s mother began to bawl again, shrieking and pleading for them to give her her baby back. Sikha smirked, reaching down and sweeping her hand along Wenes’ sharp cheekbone down to his chin, and the man sighed, looking up at her with besotted green eyes, leaning into the touch.

He was as entranced as the first time he’d seen her. Perhaps it had been the way she spoke, her hands arcing gracefully in the air, or perhaps it was the way frost crawled up her arms with little thought, melting away without any condensation to show it had once been there, or maybe it had been none of that, had purely been her, the way she spoke, the look in her eyes, the power in her stature.

As it was, he hadn’t been able to look away.

He hadn’t said a word, had sat at his mother’s side and stared at Sikha, doe-eyed to match his antlers, clearly not taking the discussion in whatsoever, which was a shame as his mother had brought him along so he could supersede her some day.

She had asked his opinion once they were home, and he had been entirely truthful when he said he’d had the time of his life.

He’d do anything to see The Winter Queen again.

It started like this: a new face in the crowd. One of the summer fae had brought her son, and with one look Sikha had wanted him, had known she’d needed him as hers. To have him walk at her heel, to have him sit beside her, to have him as hers and only ever hers, to stash away and show off at her bidding like a prized pet.

Already, as she listened idly to the Courts, watching him from the corner of her eye, she could see him in her colors, draped in her chains.

He would be hers, no matter what.

Wenes tagged along with his mother every chance he got: every meeting with the Winter Court, forcing himself to join the Summer Court’s discussions as well so that it wouldn’t seem strange, though without The Winter Queen they were nothing shy of utterly boring, and it took all he had not to fall asleep as they droned on for hours.

The next time he went to a Meeting of the Courts, there was a snowflake the size of his hand in his chair.

On the next, she passed him, ghosting her hand along his shoulders so faintly as to be able to be excused as an accident, though he nearly swooned at the chill touch on his overheated skin, certain that steam must be rising, that it would give them away.

So it was, though, that they went unnoticed, the Winter Queen receiving no more distrustful stares than was usual as she passed through the Summer Court to take her throne.

Wenes felt as though he was trembling apart, as though he was still trapped in winter’s grasp, unable, unwilling, to shake the ghost of her fingers rasping along his skin, as he took his own seat.

Her voice was… oh, but it was beautiful. Like the tinkling of reindeer’s bells, like the crunching of the most fragile of frost beneath the lightest of feet. It was only that he was surrounded by summer fae, by his mother, that he didn’t swoon fit for a young woman, didn’t drop his head in his chin, didn’t stumble forward and drop to his knees and press his face against her leg and beg for her kindness, just a single touch, just a single word, just one, please?

Wenes missed the next Meeting, but he considered it well worth it.

It had taken him quite a while — he had never been one for flowers, but flowers, he couldn’t help but to think, fit her. And he never could get her alone to speak, not with his mother always at his side, beckoning him to heel like some dog, so what better than flowers? Beautiful flowers, flowers that could speak, flowers that could convey messages?

So he snuck to her throne (with great trouble, mind) before she arrived at the Courts, and she found a bouquet sitting in her place. Sikha was quick to look them over, but only for a moment - the Court was horribly gossipy, and the slightest sign of weakness, of which romance could be taken to be, might lead to her being challenged for her place - and was quick to ascertain that they were from her boy, all summer’s flowers.

Once the Courts let out, she allowed herself to look through the offerings, a smile as rare as a summer’s blizzard gracing her face.

A vibrant red-orange dahlia - standing out from the crowd. commitment to another person. A frost-pink peony - honor. beauty. love between strangers. A handful of sunflowers - adoration. admiration. loyalty. And several striking reddish calla lilies - magnificent and overwhelming beauty.

Her boy, she thought, allowing her frost to crawl over the bouquet and preserve it, was very promising. 

Wenes found a single camellia, frosted to preservation - desire and passion, perfection, faithfulness - beneath his chair.

How she managed to place the snowglobe, a blizzard that burned his hand when he touched the glass inside of it, atop his pillow, he’d never know.

But he knew, then and there, that he needed to meet her. To speak to her, to confess his adoration, to do whatever it took if only to have a moment of her time, to have her attention solely upon him, if only, if she might grant it, to hear her voice say his name. To feel her hand upon his skin again, to let her frigid chill steal away his warmth even if only for a moment.

He’d never been a fan of the cold - no summer fae was - but if it was her then Wenes rather thought he might learn to prefer it.

Wenes seldom went out in the Northern Hemisphere during the winter months - for the most part, it was cold, and he didn’t want to risk a confrontation with a winter fae. He, and any self-respecting summer fae, tended to keep to the Southern Hemisphere where it was still warm, or hot, where the cold-loving winter fae wouldn’t be caught dead.

Any summer fae that had to go to the Northern Hemisphere for any reason would keep to the hotter states - Arizona, for the most part, Florida only if they were desperate.

No self-respecting fae went to Alaska.

Sikha, as the Winter Queen, was very well known in the Courts. Few went against her, and none lived to tell the tale.

So though he knew not where to find her, he could try to guess. She was a force of nature - a blizzard that blew in suddenly, was gone just as quickly, a hailstorm that could destroy your home, crumple it to the ground, or merely dent it as a warning.

So it was that he followed those disasters, found himself always just that little too late. Plodded through snowdrifts that steamed and dissolved beneath his feet, picked up hailstones and watched mournfully as they melted to nothing in his hands.

Though it took him months - took him so long he feared he’d have to return home to suffer his mother’s wrath, for he’d had to hide from the summer fae she’d sent after him - he managed to find a blizzard that still raged, so heavy with snow in the air that, though he squinted, shook his head and rubbed his eyes even as he strained them, he couldn’t see at all.

He walked, and he walked, and he walked. The snow melted beneath his feet, and he stumbled with each step, going down to his knees, unable to walk faster than it melted, sinking to his thighs when he managed to stand.

And oh but he was cold. Even the warmth that radiated from somewhere deep inside him couldn’t chase away this unnatural blizzard’s raw cold, couldn’t keep numbness from crawling up his fingers, from nipping at his nose.

If it weren’t for Sikha, he would surely have frozen to death.

The air went still, so quiet he could hear his heartbeat thudding in his ears. Snow stopped scoring his skin, and when he finally dared to raise his head, fumbling to wipe his eyes and rub away the frost that covered his eyelashes, he felt as though he were cradled in his snowglobe, such was the way the snow swirled around him.

And she scared him half to death, draping a thick cloak over his shoulders. His hands came up to grab it, wrapping it tight around himself as he shivered - though he adored the chill of her touch, it was too much, and the cloak was warm, wonderfully so. And, oh, but it smelled of her, of cinnamon and oranges, of pine and nutmeg and peppermint, freshly fallen snow and the cleanest of chilled water - they should have clashed, should have repulsed him, but he found he couldn’t help but to draw it just that little bit closer and breathe in deep.

He was such a pitiful sight, Sikha had to admit. Huddled in on himself, clutching the cloak she’d had made for him - and oh, but didn’t it fit him just perfectly? He looked perfect, wonderful, beautiful, and when she reached forward, taking his chin in hand, he nearly crumpled, so easily did he fall into her grasp.

‘Beautiful. So beautiful.’

He was hers, there was no saying otherwise. He was bedecked in her colors, though she needed to get him a tunic, some pants, definitely shoes. His warmth was precious, was something wonderful beneath her fingers, one of the few times she’d enjoyed a summer’s heat.

She’d do anything to protect his warmth.

“Stay.”

The word was a whisper. The barest sound, a ghost in the air; Wenes would have thought he’d imagined it if not for the breath he’d seen plume from her mouth.

He turned his head, allowed himself to nuzzle into her hand, “Yes,” and the word came with no thought, sighed from somewhere deep in his chest, without his bidding, yes, of course.

And when she stepped away from him it hurt such as if she’d taken some of him with her, as though she’d torn open his chest as she went, and he dropped to his knees though the snow was cold. Chains clinked above him and he looked up, eyes widening, when he saw the length of tiny, countless chainlinks she was offering to him.

Was this truly a good idea? To be chained and bound to the leader of his natural enemies? To trail at her heel like some dog, to kneel beside her?

Though his heart danced a quickstep, he lowered his head, relaxing when she ran her fingers through his hair with a hummed “That’s my good boy,” and oh, but he wanted to be, and some day, perhaps, he would be her love? she was already his, and let her drape the chains over him with no fuss.

She stepped back to look him over, reveled in the sight of him draped in her colors, in her chains, before gently tugging where they bunched together, urging him to his feet. He stood readily, and the Queen smiled, rewarding him by brushing his hair behind his ear.

The Winter Queen could have stabbed him then, and he would have thanked her as he fell to his knees. 

Her hand vanished into her robes, and he watched her curiously - more chains? But, no, cradled in frost-marked hands was the reddest apple he’d ever seen, frosted as if pulled fresh from an ice-chest. She offered it to him, cradling his hands in hers as he accepted it.

His eyes never left hers as the apple’s flesh crunched beneath his teeth.

The Queen hummed, tilting her head and twining one of his chains around her finger, her other hand stroking the highest prong of his nearest antler. Oh, she couldn’t help but think, they’d look beautiful adorned with chains.